The present invention relates to systems and methods for the generation and delivery of electrical and thermal energy, and to automatic control apparatus suitable for use therein; in particular, it relates to new and improved systems for generating electrical and thermal energy and for delivering it to distributed loads such as the electrical loads and thermal loads in homes.
Two of the most serious problems facing this nation and the world are the prospects of increasing fuel shortages and environmental pollution. These problems are presently somewhat interdependent, since many proposals to mitigate one problem would aggravate the other, and vice versa. While there is presently hope that systems at least partially solving these problems will be "on stream" by about the year 2,000 or so, the prospects for the intervening three decades or so have been considered quite bleak. What are urgently needed are safe solutions to these problems for the next few decades, preferably using presently available types of technology and approaches which will be acceptable to the general public. While it is of course always desirable to keep the costs of new systems as low as possible, the seriousness of the problems and the probable costs of any approach to a solution are such that very large national expenditures for capital investment in new systems can be tolerated and will probably be necessary in any case.
One approach to these problems lies in reducing the waste of energy sources such as fossil fuels. A large proportion of the energy obtained by burning such fuels is presently being wasted, and in many cases the disposal of the waste heat increases thermal pollution of the environment. A primary example of this occurs in connection with the present system of generating electricity centrally for use at distributed installations such as homes, by burning fossil fuels to release energy for operating a central electrical power generating station and distributing the centrally-generated electrical power to the distributed electrical loads by way of long distribution power lines. In typical systems of this type as much as about 70% of the heat energy from the fuel consumed at the central station is given off as waste heat, only the remaining approximately 30% being converted to electrical energy. There is little possibility of substantial improvements in the efficiency of this type of power generation at present, particularly in that the usual such system employing a heat engine to drive an electrical generator is limited by the fact that the engine will always release a substantial minimum amount of heat defined by its Carnot cycle.
While efforts are sometimes made to make use of some of the waste heat from such systems, as by using it to heat nearby homes with steam, such efforts are not presently useful at substantial distances from the central station; in most cases this is not attempted at all, and disposal of the waste heat becomes a problem in itself, requiring special equipment. Typically the waste heat is conveyed to the atmosphere immediately surrounding the power station by means of relatively costly air-cooling equipment and with attendant undesirable excessive local increase in air temperatures, or is conveyed to water-cooling equipment which is also relatively costly and results in dumping thermal pollution into rivers or other bodies of water. The supplying of necessary heat to distributed thermal loads in user installations such as homes, is ordinarily accomplished by the burning of fossil fuels in each user installation or home.
Aside from, and in addition to, such waste of energy at the central station, there is a very substantial loss in the generated electrical energy as it passes through the power distribution system by which it is conveyed to remote distributed user installations. Accurate, reliable and consistent data on the extent of this power loss are difficult to locate, in part perhaps because the providers of such data are often those associated with the power generating and/or distribution business, and are not interested in accumulating and presenting all information on all sources of overall distribution loss in actual systems, operating over long periods of time and under a variety of actual conditions. Thus, while figures of over 90% are often mentioned for efficiency of electrical distribution, there is good reason to believe that perhaps 70 to 80% may be a more realistic overall figure. Combining this with an approximately 30% generating efficiency gives an overall system efficiency of about 20 to 25%. When it is realized that the present annual fuel shortage in the nation, equivalent to about 1 billion barrels of oil per year, represents only about 40% of the fossil fuel energy used in generating electrical power, it is apparent that a 40% improvement in the overall efficiency of electrical power generation, from about 20-25% to about 60-65%, would be sufficient in itself to remedy such an annual fuel shortage.
Accordingly, it is an object of the invention to provide a new and useful system and method for generating electrical and thermal energy and for delivering it to distributed loads such as thermal and electrical loads in homes or other buildings.
Another object is to provide such a system and method which results in net reductions in energy waste as compared with present systems and methods.
A further object is to provide such a system and method which makes possible substantial reductions in the waste of fossil-fuel heat normally occurring at the central station of a centrally-powered electrical power system, and in the waste of electrical energy normally occurring in delivery of the centrally-generated electrical power to remote distributed loads.
It is also an object to provide such a system and method in which the amount of thermal pollution of the environment is reduced.
Another object is to provide such a system and method which provides a high degree of safety to the general public and to persons working on the system.
It is another object to provide apparatus, useful in said system, for assuring that a electrical generator normally connected to distribution power lines at a user installation remote from the central power station is enabled to supply electrical power to said distribution power lines only when it is connected to centrally-activated power lines.